Kidnappers, beware! You never know when your plans will go awry. And the same goes for filmmakers who decide to make a movie about kidnapping. Case in point: Alpha Dog, featuring a group of young actors -- including Justin Timberlake of ‘N Sync fame -- as well as veterans Bruce Willis and Sharon Stone. Like the real kidnapping fictionalized here, this movie falls apart quicker than you can say Nick Cassavetes, who wrote and directed it. Instead of focusing on the crime itself, Alpha Dog puts too much emphasis on the obnoxious behavior of teenagers while leading up to the kidnapping. Maybe I’m in the minority, but watching teens do drugs, have sex and scream their heads off isn’t high on my list of things that entertain or enlighten me.  

Inspired by the story of Jesse James Hollywood, one of the youngest  “Most Wanted” criminals in FBI history, Alpha Dog comes across as exploitation filmmaking at its worst. Wanna see violence and hear language that makes TV’s The Sopranos look and sound like Mother Goose -- all engaged in by youths of both sexes? If so, this one’s for you. (After my husband read that paragraph, he wanted to know how much I’m being paid to do PR for this movie.)

Of course, the names have been changed to protect the guilty. Emile Hirsch (The Emperor’s Club) portrays Johnny Truelove, a young drug dealer with an adoring posse. Ben Foster (Hostage) plays the extremely volatile Jake, who can’t pay off his latest debt to Johnny. When this happens, Johnny and his gang take Zach (Anton Yelchin), Jake’s 15-year-old brother as a hostage. Timberlake (not bad at all in an almost sympathetic role) is Frankie, a key member of Johnny’s group who’s assigned to keep tabs on Zach until Johnny decides how to handle his poorly thought-out plan. Finally, Elvis (Shawn Hatosy from Faith of My Fathers), a pal eager to win Johnny's good will, gets called in to finish the job. In the meantime, Zach has a grand time joining in the debauchery of this new lifestyle, a reaction probably based on living his entire life so far with an overly protective mother. He even loses his virginity, much to his delight.

The acting in Alpha Dogs is a mixed bag. Sharon Stone (Basic Instinct 2) gives an uneven performance as Zach’s worried mother. She’s quite believable in a family dinner scene, then over the top and practically unrecognizable at the end of the film when trying to express the mother’s feelings about the crime. Although Bruce Willis (16 Blocks) appears only briefly as Johnny’s father, he convinces us of his enabling parental behavior. But the best work in this disturbing film comes from Yelchin (Along Came a Spider). He really makes us care about what happens to Zach, and we long to shout at him, “Get away from this situation as soon as you can!”    

Come to think of it, that’s what I wish someone had yelled at me while buying a ticket for Alpha Dog.

(Released by Universal Pictures and rated “R” for pervasive drug use and language, strong violence, sexuality and nudity.)

Listen to Betty Jo's review of Alpha Dog at www.ReelTalkRadio.com.